


A Little Bitty Tear Let Me Down

by StellarLibraryLady



Series: Dancing To (And Living By) The Oldies [32]
Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies), Star Trek: Beyond - Fandom
Genre: Altamid, Angst and Feels, Bones Necklace, Emotional Hurt, First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, Jewelry, M/M, McCoy's Necklace, New Vulcan, POV Leonard "Bones" McCoy, Post-Star Trek Beyond, Sad Leonard "Bones" McCoy, Song fic, Spock Leaving, Starbase Yorktown, Tears, song related, spones - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-19
Updated: 2021-02-19
Packaged: 2021-03-14 14:15:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29543631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StellarLibraryLady/pseuds/StellarLibraryLady
Summary: What if Spock had decided to help repopulate his people at the end of Star Trek: Beyond instead of staying with Star Fleet. How would his leaving have affected McCoy?
Relationships: Leonard "Bones" McCoy/Spock
Series: Dancing To (And Living By) The Oldies [32]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/840585
Comments: 4
Kudos: 14





	A Little Bitty Tear Let Me Down

McCoy was wandering aimlessly in his quarters while he absently fingered the recently acquired necklace that lay just beneath the hollow of his bare throat. He was not accustomed to wearing a necklace. That was why he found himself touching this one so often. At least that was what he told himself whenever he caught himself unconsciously handling the pendant dangling from its glistening chain. It couldn't possibly be for some other reason, like that it reminded him of its benefactor or something silly like that.

Spock had recently presented it to him as a token of his esteem and respect and as a way of saying thanks for saving his life when he had been injured during their crash landing on Altamid. McCoy had said that he'd needed no thanks for doing that. After all, he was a doctor. That's what he did. But he had stopped short during his discourse when he'd realized that it was more important for Spock to give the gift than it was for McCoy to receive it. Spock had finally worked up the courage to extend himself to someone else. McCoy should at least have the decency not to stifle the gesture that Spock had made. Sometimes you just gotta make allowances so the other guy can make some personal growth, you know? Accept the gift at face value, he'd prompted himself. That was surely how it had been given.

McCoy had also realized that Spock was not all that comfortable showing that much vulnerability to anyone, so it was quite rare that he was doing so now. The least that McCoy could do was to accept Spock's offering in the spirit in which it was being offered. And if McCoy chose to protect the softness that Spock was being brave enough to expose because of bestowing that gift, so be it. It was the least he could do, McCoy decided. So McCoy did. Because, well, dang it, he could extend himself and be a buddy, too, if needed! Besides, he'd gotten sort of used to taking care of Spock on Altamid and protecting him, so he might as well protect him this way, too.

McCoy glanced down at his jewelry. It was a handsome necklace indeed, if he had to say so himself. It was a disc with a medical caduceus on it, and the chain looked to be made of pure gold. Such an expensive token! It had to have set the Vulcan back a pretty penny to make such an expensive gesture.

But McCoy seemed to understand that the necklace represented more to Spock than just an appreciation for saving his life. It was a symbol for all of the unspoken nuances to their intense and diverse relationship which had finally jelled into a recognized friendship when they were stranded together on Altamid. They had come off that planet being friends, or at least something more than the fellow officers and colleagues which they had been up to that time.

And that had added a new intimacy to a convoluted relationship that had always been fraught with an angst caused from everything from their constant bickering to a mutual desire to have Jim Kirk's exclusive attention. Perhaps something else was also going on to cause conflict between them. But neither one had ever wanted to explore those conflicting emotions before Altamid, and each had been skirting their feelings since they'd gotten back to Starbase Yorktown. These were emotions that should only be addressed with the fullness of time, as the saying goes, instead of McCoy's usual bull-in-the-china-shop approach which he generally used when confronting Spock. And neither would Spock be allowed to do his usual shoving of the emotion aside, never to be reexamined again. (McCoy would want that point about Spock added to the record, too.)

Because something strange had happened on Altamid. Even though they were scrambling for their lives, they hadn't had an audience to play to. Jim Kirk nor anybody else was present. It was just them in the quiet moments allotted to them. They had to rely on each other for survival. But they'd also had to learn how to be company for each other. After all, this rocky planet may well have been where they'd spent the rest of their lives.

So they'd had the time to reach some understandings and perspectives. They even got to know each other better and thus understand each other a little bit more. It took a little of the edge off their rivalry and helped them to realize that they really were on the same team. They knew that in the future-- if they indeed had a future beyond the next few hours-- they would be more comfortable and contented with each other.

But if the miracle happened that they got off Altamid and got on with their lives, that wouldn't stop their bickering in the future. Oh, no, they were used to that now. It defined them. It was what they did. And besides-- well, hell, McCoy had to admit to himself-- they just plain liked doing it. He liked going a round or two with the little green bastard who could be pigheaded to a fault. But Spock could stick to his guns. McCoy had to give the Devil his due on that one. And he secretly suspected that Spock liked arguing with him, too.

And so they had existed on Altamid and continued to draw breath, which was a miracle just in itself.

Then it all got rather hazy and speeded up. Because stuff had happened, and being trapped became just another adventure in the lives of two space pioneers.

For they had been rescued from Altamid in spectacular fashion and then they had helped to save Yorktown from complete annihilation by Krall. And then they even prevented Jim Kirk from being sucked into space. Then all too suddenly, it was decision time again for what Kirk and Spock should do with their futures. Kirk had decided that he didn't want to fly a desk, and Spock had opted for becoming Daddy of the Year on New Vulcan.

And just like that, it was over.

Now there would be no further probing of the contradictory association between McCoy and Spock with all of its crazy ups and downs. No more would they heckle each other or drive each other to distraction by their seemingly endless bickering. But also would there be no more backing each other up or no more saving each other's life-- which they had done time after time in the years that they had served together.

All of that was over. For Spock had decided to help with the repopulation of the Vulcan race after Nero had nearly wiped it out. That meant leaving Star Fleet and joining the Vulcan people on their new home planet to assume his rightful role as a true patriarch by taking multiple wives to impregnate. Any other male would be gloating. What a dream scenario! But to Spock, it would simply be his duty.

McCoy had been stunned when he'd heard of Spock intentions. He mentioned a Plan B that would negate Spock's having to be on site to fulfill his obligations. Artificial insemination had been perfected hundreds of years ago, and McCoy was certain that he could rig up something to achieve what was needed. Then Spock could sprinkle his seed around the whole universe if he wished, not just on New Vulcan in order to produce endless lines of infants with black bangs and no visible senses of humor. To that suggestion, Spock had displayed his own lack of humor by announcing that he was not in favor of that sort of solution. McCoy had finally stomped away muttering that the little green bastard just wanted to do things the old fashioned way.

But that did not compare to the mixed emotions shown by Nyota Uhura when she'd learned that her sometime boyfriend was setting himself up with a harem. She was still seething when it came time for Spock to leave, but McCoy suspected that her wrath dealt more with pride than loss of love. No woman would like to think that she'd lost her beau not to another woman, but to many. She still hadn't thawed when Spock was scheduled to leave, but scattered ice chips everywhere she stepped. Hell ain't got no fury like the wrath of a woman scorned seemed to be a saying that had been written for Uhura on this occasion.

As for McCoy at Spock's sendoff, he'd muttered some sort of standard adieu as he'd stared past Spock's left ear. An ear which McCoy would never get to run his tongue around, he'd suddenly realized. Or plunge it deep inside that alien mouth and wallow it around for awhile, either.

Where had that come from?!

Spock's mouth was moving. He was apparently talking, saying something that in his opinion was probably noteworthy and astute. But McCoy could not understand what he was saying for the roaring in his ears.

And no wonder! Spock was leaving! Really leaving! And there wasn't a damn thing that could be done about it now!

McCoy had felt tears stinging his eyes as an overwhelming sense of loss had swept over him, then he had ducked out of the farewells as quickly as he could. He did not remember leaving Spock's presence; he just knew he had to get out of there. McCoy did not care if he had appeared rude or uncaring. It wasn't that at all. He did not want to show how much he really did care.

Why hadn't he realized any of that before? Why had it all come crashing down on him at the moment of final parting?

Well, he had the rest of the rest of his life to figure that one out, but he knew that he never would come up with a satisfactory answer.

And now he paced his quarters and hoped that Spock had been beamed to the passing ship with no problems. McCoy still did not trust transporters or the whole idea of being in space. But that was another topic, and now he was concerned about Spock's leaving. He just wanted the parting to be over and not prolonged. If it had to happen, then let it be fast. Rip the band-aid off in one swift jerk. Don't make it anymore painful than it had to be.

He wanted a return to an ordinary routine while he tried to ignore the emptiness that had suddenly and jarringly come into his life. An emptiness that would last forever, he now realized. For who or what could ever replace Spock?

Then McCoy heard a knock on his door and settled the necklace back on his throat with a caress of his fingertips so it would be safe until the next time that he would seek out its familiar shape.

That knock would be Jim. Alone. Meaning that Spock was gone. McCoy drew his breath in sharply, then held it for the briefest moment before letting it out slowly.

Might as well accept the obvious and get it over with. Delaying it wouldn't help matters any now. This was the start of life without Spock in it. Might as well get on with it.

Time to rip off the band-aid.

"Come."

The door slid open and Jim Kirk stared levelly at McCoy. McCoy stared back at Kirk's face washed clean of any emotion. Neither blinked. Neither spoke. Because they both understood what it all meant.

Spock. Gone.

Now it was just the two of them. Just the way it had been at first, until Spock had wormed his way into their lives and their hearts. And he had done it so unknowingly, so thirstily in his own need, that they had welcomed him inside with huge, relieved smiles. Because it had felt so good and so right for him to be there with them.

And now he was gone.

And there would be a big hollow space beside McCoy and Kirk forevermore now. Who would've thought that aggravating little green bastard would come to mean so much to both of them? But why go over that heartache anymore? It would just hurt them both and would not bring Spock back to them.

A tic inspired by pain flashed in McCoy's cheek, and his eye squinted for a moment because of it. "Might as well come on in, Jim, and have a drink. I think we both need one... after that. But I don't know if I've got a glass big enough to hold the drink we'll be needing," he muttered as he turned toward his liquor stores. "But we can try." His voice sounded more like a funeral dirge than an invitation, though.

But Jim Kirk wouldn't mind. He wouldn't be in a very happy mood, either. He would be wanting what McCoy was wanting. Company. For he had loved Spock, too. Just like McCoy had.

For McCoy had loved Spock. He could admit it now when he never could before. He had loved Spock. He might even have been a little bit in love with him, or could have been in time. And now Spock was gone. And McCoy had to keep on breathing. That was going to be the hard part. McCoy had to keep on living even though love was gone out of it for him for good.

A bridesmaid once again!

Behind McCoy, a step was heard and the door whooshed shut. The two aching friends with their breaking hearts were alone at last with their mutual grief.

McCoy flinched. Kirk's presence wasn't soothing him as much as McCoy thought it would. He felt oddly awkward. Off balance. At sea. Adrift. As if not even Jim Kirk could help him, either.

McCoy tried to pull himself together. For Jim's sake. Maybe alcohol would help. "So the little green bastard really did it, didn't he? Did it the way he'd always threatened he would." He frowned as the enormity of what he was saying hit him. "He really left... us. For good."

What he'd really wanted to say was "me" instead of "us." And suddenly McCoy realized with stunning clarity how really true the "me" part would have been. But now it was too late for honestly, especially to oneself. Spock really and truly had left.

McCoy bit his lips together. "Didn't he?" He needed Jim to confirm it so it would be real.

"No, I did not, Doctor."

Spock!

Stunned, eyes bulging and mouth dropped open and flopping by its hinges, McCoy whirled.

Spock--

There stood Spock with his hands behind his back, looking complacent and cool and in control as ever. Just like always.

Spock....

The cool voice continued quietly. "And while it is true that my skin tone is indeed of a greenish hue because of the copper in my blood as opposed to the iron in yours, I must remind you that I am not a bastard. My parents were legally married, a fact I can have substantiated to anyone's satisfaction. Even yours." His voice was unnerving and maddeningly mocking and slightly bored.

Just like always, too.

"I never doubted your legitimacy," McCoy said hollowly and wondered how they had gotten stuck in this sort of discussion already when he wanted to ask about so many other things. So he did and set the legitimacy issue firmly aside. "What changed your mind? What made you stay?" Then. "Why are you even here? With me? Now? What made you decide to stay?" he finished softly because he was sensing something in Spock he had never felt before: Need. A need from Spock. For McCoy. And Spock didn't quite know how to handle what was happening to his own emotions.

"What changed my mind?" Spock repeated from all the questions that McCoy had just asked him. "Your eyes, Doctor, your eyes. They were different today at my departure ceremony. Tears were standing in them," he answered in a voice that was somehow softer than McCoy had ever heard before from him. Apparently Spock heard the unusual softness, too, for he hastily assumed a more businesslike tone. "Even though you were trying to look through me, I realized you were hiding your true feelings. And that intrigued me. I need to know what they really are. And why you were so upset by them."

"Oh, you do, do you?" McCoy snorted. "And just what makes you think that I'll admit to having any feelings that could be upset? You never would admit to me to having emotions. So why can't I act the same contrary way?"

"Because it would be an excellent opportunity for you to extol the virtues of admitting to not only possessing emotions, but to having your actions guided by them. What an excellent teaching tool you now have at your disposal. I would think that this sort of scenario would delight you."

The bastard! He really was a bastard, and it had nothing to do with his legitimacy!

"You make a mockery of anything, don't you?" McCoy snarled, but he did not like the anger he was displaying. Besides twisting his face, it felt like it was twisting up his insides and making him physically ill.

"There it is again, Doctor. Genuine emotion. Though different from what you were displaying at my farewell ceremony."

McCoy could not answer. It all seemed so futile somehow, as if they would be going down the wrong path conversationally if he uttered the reasonable retort that was on his tongue. Besides, it was familiar ground to both of them. Too familiar. And something else was more important to be discussed now instead of McCoy's emotions and Spock's apparent lack of them.

Spock could tell that he had struck a telling blow, however, so he continued with his advantage. "You are many things, Doctor, but an accomplished actor is not one of them. Those were real tears I saw in your eyes today, real tears that were puddled in your lower eyelids, real tears that threatened to stream at any moment unchecked down both of your cheeks. They were quite impressive. And appealing. They spoke more eloquently than most words that you have ever uttered."

"Maybe I faked that, Commander. Maybe I wanted to appeal to your sympathy by yanking out a couple of nasal hairs so that I appeared to be weeping like a young maiden. Did you ever think about that? Actors do that all the time when they have to do a sad scene. Maybe I just borrowed the trick from them."

Spock frowned in thought.

McCoy continued what to him was a confession, but to Spock probably seemed like something mocking.

Good. Good. Don't let the Vulcan know the truth.

"Maybe I just wanted you to think that I was upset by your leaving and would move Heaven and Earth not to admit it." McCoy was exposing his heart here to tell Spock the unvarnished truth in a sort of doubletalk that was coming honestly from him, but probably being perceived by Spock as yet another smokescreen from McCoy. "As I've said before, you can be two places at once. Serve on the Enterprise, but send your sperm to the new Vulcan colony. I can set you up with all of the appropriate porn that you'll need to get in the mood. Pictures of all sorts of computers with their innards exposed and stripped down to their barest components. You'll cum for a week, Commander. Guaranteed."

Spock stared at him for a long moment, then pronounced crisply as he turned to leave. "I can see that I was mistaken to come here. I will not trouble you any further, Doctor. I will continue on my original agenda. I am certain that I could still have the transporter ship hailed so that I might board her."

"What about Jim? I don't know what he'd do without you."

Spock's eyes crackled as Spock turned back and stared fiercely at McCoy. "Jim Kirk has no place in this discussion. And you know it."

Spock had played his last ace. And a big one.

Truth time. Could McCoy counter that big ace?

After a few tense moments, Spock lowered his eyes and turned away. "Perhaps I was mistaken. Excuse me."

Leaving. Again!

"Wait."

Spock turned back. They stared at each other.

What an impasse!

"Well, Doctor? I am certain that we both have things to do with our lives that will be more productive than gazing wordlessly across a room at each other while the minutes tick away. While some may consider that to be a pleasant pastime, I do not."

That's when McCoy knew. Whether it was the whining appeal of pleading in Spock's voice that Spock hadn't intended to show or a shiny glint in Spock's own dark eyes, McCoy just knew. Spock didn't want to leave, but he did not know how to say that he wanted to stay. Spock's ace had been a fake, and he'd known it. And now McCoy knew it, too.

The question was, how was McCoy going to use that to his advantage?

He decided to throw in his cards and call the game over. He didn't want to take advantage of any sign of weakness from Spock. Suddenly, something else seemed more important. What that something was, he really couldn't say, but he fully understood that he agreed with Spock's summation: They were wasting their time.

"Oh, hell, this ain't working for either one of us," McCoy declared in exasperation. "Neither one of us knows what he's doing here, do we? We're more handicapped than a couple of left-handed porcupines in a right-handed slapping contest."

Spock looked confused, as well he should. He was not certain if that had been an idiom or a metaphor or some hodgepodge of the English language that McCoy had just used. "Doctor? Can you explain yourself please?"

"It means that we'll muck this up if we ain't careful. And I have a feeling that if we do, we'll lose our chance at something good," McCoy answered. Then he crossed the room. He stopped just in front of Spock and searched his eyes. "And I don't want to muck this up. Because I sure as hell don't want to lose my chance at happiness. And I think that lies with you. And I don't think you want to lose that chance, either, or else you'd been long gone on your way to New Vulcan to become a super stud! I think you want to be a stud right here! With me!" McCoy whispered hotly.

Spock looked startled, but McCoy didn't stop for further explanations or talking as he threw his arms around Spock and drew him close just the way he suddenly realized he'd always wanted to do for a long time.

Spock stiffened with the contact, and McCoy hoped that he wouldn't retaliate with the Vulcan Nerve Pinch. That would be kind of a mood breaker at the moment, especially the way that McCoy had declared himself so brazenly and all with his all-encompassing hug.

But thankfully, Spock seemed to mold himself against McCoy and then snaked his own arms around the guy who was trying to tell Spock so much with his hands and arms and finally with his lips. Seemed that Spock liked the way that McCoy was communicating and decided to answer in the same way. Funny how they had so much to say then, but not a word was spoken.

Things got a whole lot friendlier between them after that. And the accommodating ship left without its additional passenger bound for New Vulcan. It seemed that Mr. Spock was staying with Starfleet and the Enterprise, after all.

Spock sent all the sperm that the Vulcan colony required for reproduction purposes. McCoy said that was alright as long as Spock didn't want to administer it in person. Spock just gave McCoy a soft smile and inferred that the only one who would be receiving Spock's sperm firsthand was not Vulcan. Or even female.

Just as long as the other person was responsive to Spock's advances.

McCoy thought that would be a good compromise.

He figured he could handle that part of Spock's conditions just fine.

**Author's Note:**

> I own nothing of the song "A Little Bitty Tear" by Burl Ives, nor do I represent the estate of the late Mr. Ives. I also do not own anything of Star Trek, its characters and/or its storylines.


End file.
